Самойлов, Н. А. IMAGE OF PETER THE GREAT AND IDEOLOGY OF THE REFORM MOVEMENT IN CHINA AT THE END OF THE 19TH CENTURY // Proceedings of Petrozavodsk State University. 2020. Vol. 42. No 4. P. 107–114. DOI: 10.15393/uchz.art.2020.489


To the 350th anniversary of the birth of Peter the Great

IMAGE OF PETER THE GREAT AND IDEOLOGY OF THE REFORM MOVEMENT IN CHINA AT THE END OF THE 19TH CENTURY

Самойлов
Н. А. 		Saint Petersburg State University
Keywords:
Peter the Great
China
Reform movement
Kang Youwei
historical imagology		 Summary: The image of Peter the Great and his reforms greatly attracted Chinese thinkers of the 19th century. The first evaluative discourse on Peter I appeared in China in the mid-19th century. This was fragmentary information, mainly gleaned from randomly chosen Western sources. However, brief assessments of his activities were very positive. At that time Peter I appeared to Chinese thinkers as an exotic figure. At the same time, the person of the Russian Emperor and scale of his activities appealed to them a lot. The power of Russia achieved by the 19th century, in their opinion, was predetermined by the reforms of Peter I. It was especially noted that Peter the Great actively urged his compatriots to take lessons from foreign experience. The greatest attention to the personality of Peter the Great and his reforms was paid by the outstanding Chinese reformer Kang Youwei. For him, Peter was a symbol of an extremely successful transformations to follow and learn from. At the same time, in his opinion, Peter I acted in accordance with the will of Heaven, without violating Universal Harmony. That was seen as the key to his success. Thus, in the 19th century China Peter the Great became a symbol of the successful implementation of reforms and the adoption of foreign experience. The image of the Emperor-Reformer, the wise ruler of a vast country was entrenched in Peter I for a long time. The history of the appearance of the image of Peter the Great in China, the process of its sociocultural representation and adaptation, as well as the use of the image of the Russian emperor and his transformations in the ideological substantiation of reforms in the Qing Empire at the end of the 19th century is the goal of this study. The relevance of the article arises from the need to study the formation and development of Sino-Russian mutual images at different stages of the history and in different regions, since these images and stereotypes inevitably affect the Russia-China bilateral relations.



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